


What was Lost

by FilipinoMestiza



Category: Assassin's Creed
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Tragedy, Character Death, Dreams and Nightmares, Gen, Gore, Graphic Description, Grief/Mourning, Psychological Trauma, Victorian era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-30
Updated: 2016-01-30
Packaged: 2018-05-17 04:10:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5853616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FilipinoMestiza/pseuds/FilipinoMestiza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I SING what was lost and dread what was won,<br/>I walk in a battle fought over again,<br/>My king a lost king, and lost soldiers my men;<br/>Feet to the Rising and Setting may run,<br/>They always beat on the same small stone"</p><p>- William Butler Yeats</p><p> </p><p>A request made by morie91, because she and I have a tendency to think of the worst case scenarios, and putting it into our works for all of you to enjoy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What was Lost

**Author's Note:**

  * For [morie91](https://archiveofourown.org/users/morie91/gifts).



For the first time in her life, Evie became fearful of the silence. It felt like a heavy cloth had been dropped on her aching shoulders; her breaths came out in deep, lengthy sighs, transforming into sallow ghostlike mists in the glacial air of the underground chambers. She stared, in hard-hearted satisfaction, at the lifeless form of Jack the Ripper, formerly known to his fellow Assassins as simply Jack the Lad. The state of excitement had fled, and was soon replaced by a sensation of utter trepidity. Evie released the spike that she had used to finally end the manifested terror; her very heart was soaring in aversion at the thought of Jacob. She hurried. The cell door was downright burdensome as she wrenched it open to finally reach her brother. Dragging the corpse of Jack inside, she shut the door and neared the slumped figure in the corner.

Jacob sat in a heap, like a rag doll cast aside by its owner. The oil lamp hanging by a nail on the stone wall provided very little illumination for Evie to measure his dire injuries. She was quick to appear at his side, and gently cradled him into her arms. The idea of him being caged down here, with no knowledge of the time or day, twisted her face into a pained expression. With careful movements, Evie lifted Jacob’s face to see that his right eye had been beaten to a point of severity: the skin around it was swollen, with a trail of blood pouring out of its side, as though he had been crying.

“Jacob.” She called out to him, trying to awaken him from the slumber he had fallen into. A loud screech of metal resonated in the chamber, but Evie did not move to acknowledge who had entered the holding cell: all of her awareness was focused on her twin brother.

“Miss Frye, what the hell happened here?” Abberline’s voice was laced with shock and temper.

“Nothing, Inspector. Nothing happened here.” She pulled Jacob closer to her so that he could finally rest his head somewhere less uncomfortable. Glancing back at Abberline, she knitted her brows in vexation. “Trust me, Jack the Ripper is dead.”

“Inspector!” the cry of one policeman echoed down the vaults and into their very nerves.

“Now help me, Frederick.” Evie pleaded. “No one must ever know that Jack the Ripper was an Assassin.”

“Inspector! The journalists are here!” came the cry once more. The Inspector stood rigid in his spot, calculating the request in his head. The tension that hovered between them grew taut with each passing second. Then, Abberline tucked his revolver into its holster and paced back to the door. Evie held her breath for what was about to come—

“I want those vultures gone in an instant! Is that clear?” He shouted his orders to the awaiting policemen above the stairs. She could have cried out in relief if she wanted to. But Evie only gave him an appreciative nod and returned to her damaged brother.

The constant bewailing might have been the catalyst for stirring Jacob out his deep sleep: he opened his unharmed eye and steadily shifted his gaze toward the person holding him. “Evie...” he wheezed.

His twin sister smiled by a fraction. “It’s over, Jacob. I’m here.”

“A little too late, I’m afraid.” Evie quickly frowned at that. She inspected more of his person and discovered the great laceration at his left flank: the gash itself was cavernous, releasing more of Jacob’s life in ounces.

“Jack.” She hissed the name through clenched teeth. Poor little Jack had planned this to make her suffer even if he was gone from this world. “Jacob, I need you to stay awake.”

“I will try.”

Evie unflinchingly pressed her hand against the injury, eliciting a loud grunt from Jacob, but found that she could not cover the entire incision. Frantically, she turned to Abberline and begged him to call for a doctor. The Inspector nodded once and rushed out of the cell. The immaculate white gloves she had worn were turning into a dark shade of crimson, almost black in the drab light. All of a sudden, Jacob reached up and grasped her arm.

“Evie,” he said, his tone grave and somewhat fading. “Stop, please.”

“Jacob, what are you doing?” Evie questioned as she felt his hand move down to where she was trying to cease the hemorrhage.

“Don’t. You and I both know what this entails. I am aware that I’ve lost enough of blood to feel the numbness creeping in. I simply do not wish to have your efforts wasted.”

“You are delusional, Jacob! Cease this nonsense at once!” Evie now shouted at her twin. A grin appeared on his weathered face: it reminded her so much of the days when he thought of his tasks as child’s play. He was so brash, so haughty, so very Jacob of him. She could not help but feel the hand of awareness touching her shoulder and whisper words of ominous possibilities into her ear.

“Please, Jacob, I didn’t return to London to watch you die!”

But Jacob did not seem to hear her. Instead, he gazed into her worried face and saw the smallest hint of a tear clinging to the corner of her eye. “I’ve always driven you mad, even when we were children.” He chuckled and stopped only to cough. “I’ve missed you. I’ve missed you a lot since you left for India. I really felt so small without your presence lurking around to scold me.”

Evie had now resorted to listen to what he had to say. Her hand steadily began to remove itself from his side. “But you had Sarah to watch over you. In fact, I remember she once wrote to me about her vexations, how you often act more like a fussy infant than an actual gentleman.”

Jacob instantly frowned at the mention of his wife. “Do you think she will hate me for leaving so soon?”

“She’ll understand, Jacob.” Evie said, her voice lowering into a mere whisper.

“And you?” She had nothing to remark. No comeback or scolding could ever answer to that question.

Evie held him closer to her, and in that special instant, their breathing synchronized, and their hearts drummed against one another. She felt the very life of him pressing itself into hers like entities coming together to form one being. His arms wrapped themselves around her waist as he once did so many years ago. It was unfair. He was the youngest; why did he have to be taken this early in their age? Evie grimaced and buried her face into Jacob’s hair, relishing whatever limited time they had left.

“Jacob, I’m so sorry. I should have come sooner.”

“It’s not your fault, Evie. It was never your fault.” But it felt as though it was.

“Stay a little while? For your sister?”

“I will see what I can do.” Jacob mumbled into her robes. He let out a much heavier sigh, warming the area with his waning breath. “Tell my wife...tell her how much I love her, and that I will continue to do so...in the next world.”

“Jacob.” She felt for his gasps as it came in short puffs. Then, little by little, it slowed. And like a train that has reached its final terminus, it stopped after one final exhalation. Evie waited, thinking he was slumbering the pain away. But when the blood eventually stopped flowing, and the heaviness of Jacob’s body began to settle in, she hunched over and let out a cry that rang throughout the vaults of the asylum.

 _It’s not your fault, Evie._ The words ran in her head that it caused actual pain to manifest. She could not fathom as to why fate had been so cruel. She had nearly lost him before; now she lost him forever. Jacob, her idiot of a brother, the less disciplined Frye Twin. What would the balladeers sing of his demise? Will it be full of mirth from his greatness as an infamous leader? Or would it consist of his pitiful moments, trapped in some dark and diseased-ridden vault, with only the memories of his former life keeping him sane? Evie was not certain: it was like someone had seized her heart and ripped the anatomy right out of her chest.

When they had finally emerged from underground, Evie did not leave her brother’s side, even when Abberline insisted that they should bring his body to the morgue to be cleaned. For a minute there, the Inspector seemed unsympathetic for her loss, but one look into his dark eyes and you could see his internal struggle: in the view of the public, Abberline was a hardened man that would do anything to put an end to all of the atrocities in London. But, in the scrutiny of a mourning twin sister, he was someone who had just lost a friend.

“How will you convey this tale to Mrs. Frye?” Abberline had asked. Evie did not know how to proceed. She knew that Jacob had sent his dear wife to live in Dulwich Village, where she was safe from the Whitechapel Murders.

“If you’ll allow me, I will oversee the proceedings at the morgue.” The Inspector told her solemnly. “Think of it as my honorarium for everything you two have done for me.”  
Evie said not a word. She only nodded and departed for her journey to Dulwich Village. Outside, she halted her steps and turned her blood-stained palms toward her. She couldn’t let Sarah see her like this. With quick tugs, she took off the sullied gloves and tossed them into the shrubberies before calling for a growler.

 

 _It’s not your fault, Evie._ The words came a second time as she stood rigidly in front of the gated house. A porter then approached her, and she told him what was needed to be said. She did not know what to expect when she was finally allowed inside. To say that Sarah had not aged a bit was a distortion of what she truly was. She looked beautiful as she always had in her youth, but her countenance foretold the hardships she had endured for the sake of her family.

“Evie, it has been so long!” The blonde woman quickly pulled her sister-in-law into a much needed embrace. “Why are you here, if I may ask? I haven’t heard from Jacob in months since he last wrote to me. Do you bring news of him?”

“Sarah.” The minute she spoke, Evie wished she had chosen her tone. The look of elation, the hopeful expression of a wife awaiting her husband’s eventual return, had completely vanished in an instant.

“I’m so sorry.”

“Evie, where is Jacob?”

She gave her brother’s wife a downcast stare, and carefully uttered the crucial message. “Jacob wanted me to tell you...that he loved you with all his heart, Sarah, and he would go on loving you even in the afterlife.”

Sarah stared at her for the longest time until the tears came on their own. She quivered for a moment to let out a small cry before she righted herself. “And where is he now?”

“He is being looked after by Inspector Abberline, at the morgue near the Thames.”

“Good, good.” Sarah sniffed and started to whimper. Her composure began to crumble, and Evie was there to support her. She cried onto her shoulder, gasping out, “I understand that he would one day leave us, but did it have to be so soon?”

“I know, and I’m sorry. I should have been quicker.”

“It’s not your fault, Evie. It’s not.” _But I had lost him, all the same._

 

The third and final time that terrible phrase returned, it had came from her dear husband: Henry traveled to England as soon as he had gotten word of the tragedy, and did his best to console his wife before the last rites were performed. Sarah had begged them to stay at the manor house, as she and the children needed their attendance now more than ever. The couple obliged, having taken a room with a view of the gardens.

“I feel as though there is a wall wedged between us.” Henry remarked as they had gotten ready for bed that evening.

“Have I really been this distant the entire time?” Evie inquired, looking away from him. She heard the rustle of the coverlets and felt an arm wrapping itself around her waist.

“It is a difficult time for all of us, especially you. But would Jacob want to see as you are at this very moment?” Evie shook her head and turned to face Henry.

“It’s just that...I cannot accept the truth, Jayadeep. I know that I have to, but I don’t...” She paused to blink away the hindering tears. “If only I had reached him in time!”

Henry held her vulnerable form and quietly whispered words of encouragement to her. “It’s not your fault, Evie. None of us believe that. It is just the way we Assassins choose to live our lives, and Jacob had spent the most of it doing what he deemed best.”

How are you for certain? Perhaps her brother had wanted to live long enough to watch his entire family prosper. Their father is gone now, all because of me, Evie thought as she delved deeper into the bedspreads, inhaling a faint lavender scent mixed with the exotic fragrance her husband carried all the way from India. She dreamed of Crawley and its stretch of land and rolling hills. She remembered the countless stagecoaches that entered their little town, carrying with it pilgrims from London to Brighton, and there and back. In one of those coaches, she saw the unforgettable image of Jacob hunching forward like a prisoner waiting for the gallows. Evie cried out to him, pleading at the driver to stop. But the coachman brings up his whip and strikes down on the midnight black stallions, effectively forcing them into a full gallop.

“No, don’t go! Jacob!” she exclaimed. All of sudden, someone had stabbed her in the gut with a sharp object. Evie gasped out from the shock, looking up to see the haunting figure of Jack standing over her prone form.

“I thought I killed you. You’re supposed to be dead, you bastard!”

“I will never die, Miss Frye. So as long as you live, I will be here, waiting, until there is nothing left to rip and tear for the crows to feast upon.” 

Evie tried to grab at his dark cloak, but the image exploded into a murder of cawing blackbirds that scratched and pecked at her face. She is aware that the spike was still embedded in her, rocking back and forth, tearing her intestines apart. Then, someone had grabbed her shoulders and pinned her down to the ground. To her horror, Evie saw that it was Sarah, all dressed up in her mourning gown and veil. Her blonde hair flew about as it was tousled by the crows, but she didn’t seem to care.

“You took him away from me!” she howled into her face. “You did this to us! You!”

“No! Sarah, I—”

Evie paused to feel a strange sensation bubbling up her throat, and on instinct she spat out the foreign substance from her mouth, suddenly understanding that it was her own blood. The woman on top of her has driven the spike further to the very hilt, gorging it deeper and deeper till it might have scored through her back. Everything is draped in red now. Was this her punishment for failing her brother? A disemboweling for a mission she had miscarried? Finally, the ghastly entity stops her torture. Evie wanted to know what she would do next: it felt as though she replaced the spike with her very hands, and was now intent on pulling her guts out of her stomach. The crows above were spinning around her darkening vision, and one of them plunges down to take the first taste of their meal.

“Evie!” The said woman opened her eyes in a flurry and grabbed at the nearest thing she could reach: the cloth of her husband’s linen shirt. Surrounding the bed were the worried faces of Sarah and her maids.

“Are you all right, Evie?” The blonde woman asked before handing her a glass of water. “We heard your scream from across the hall.” Evie searched for words, but found none. She had not enough courage in herself to tell them what she had seen in her nightmare. However, Sarah seemed to have an inkling of what she had actually seen through her feverish dream, and decided to usher everyone, excluding Henry, out of the room so she could recollect her presence of mind.

The older Frye twin said nothing to her husband, and simply settled to let out her anguish through tears and muffled weeping.

 

Outside the manor house, straw was strewn in the drive to deaden the sound of hooves and wheels. Inside, the mirrors were turned, shutters closed, and curtains drawn to create the somber effect everyone expected at a wake. Evie knew her brother laid in that coffin, which remained closed due to his unrepairable disfigurement. It was best if the children did not see what had become of their father in his death. But they are likely to remember his handsome visage through photographs and stories told by their ever so patient mother. Her nephew had approached some time during the vigil, and offered his condolences.

“I should be the one to offer them, love.” Looking at how he appeared as a young man, Evie wondered if he had the same kind of boyish charm his father had.

“I know. But he was your family before ours. You deserve it more than we do.”

“You’re just as kind as your mother,” Evie remarked offhandedly. Her nephew nodded and vaguely glanced toward his surviving parent, who had chosen to wear white instead of the dreaded black.

“Aunt Evie.” She turned her attention back to the young man beside her. “Though my father had acted irresponsibly for the past few months, I understood that he did just that to protect all of us. None of us is to be blamed for Jack. It was simply how the world fashioned him in his vulnerable years.”

Evie looked to the boy and marveled at how he had matured so quickly all these years. Jacob might be gone, but he had left a legacy in his wake. Though it will take some weeks or possibly even months before the family could move on, Evie knew her own demonstrations of grief will continue. Her eyes will never hold the same light as it did whenever she raced with her twin to the train, nor would she ever regain her exuberant spirit and enthusiasm when training new initiates into the Brotherhood.

And every night, as she laid her head to rest on a downy pillow, Jack the Ripper will be there to besiege her dreams with tormenting schemes, forever reminding her of what she had lost and what she had failed to do.

_It is not my fault, but it feels as though it should be. Jacob is dead, but I can still hear his laughter echoing through the streets of London. And, in the coming days, I will soon join him and partake in whatever merriment the afterlife could offer to us._

**Author's Note:**

> The song that helped me write this dreadful thing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sm4taNsAOMM
> 
> Hasty ending because I am no good at funerals. I never liked the idea of just sitting down there, knowing that someone you once knew was inside that ominous coffin. It makes me nervous sometimes, especially if you knew you'd follow them some day.
> 
> The only time I did something inappropriate at a funeral was during my "carefree" days with my cousins. We were next to view the person, but then Cousin Toto told me not to laugh as he gestured me to look down. And when I did I saw that the dead person couldn't fit in his own coffin and he looked like he had been squeezed into it. So I might have snorted, but at least I didn't get scolded.
> 
> So here you go, morie91. Now, hand me that box of tissues over there!


End file.
